biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1834–96)
|
| biography:
| Craftsman, poet, and political activist, born in Walthamstow, NC Greater London, UK. Educated at Marlborough College, he studied for holy orders at Oxford, but renounced the Church, studied architecture, then became a professional painter (1857–62). In 1861, after designing and furnishing his marital home, he founded the firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co, which revolutionized the art of house decoration and furniture in England. His literary career began with a volume of poetry. He visited Iceland twice (1871, 1873), and was inspired to write The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Nibelungs (4 vols, 1876), regarded as the greatest of his many works. His belief that the excellence of mediaeval arts and crafts was destroyed by Victorian mass-production and capitalism led him to join the Social Democratic Federation in 1883, and he subsequently organized the Socialist League. In 1890 he founded the Kelmscott Press at Hammersmith, issuing his own works and reprints of classics. |
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